


Rainy days and happy tears

by Lollipop_Panda



Category: A3! (Video Game)
Genre: Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, I just want them happy okay?, Introspection, Rain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-10
Updated: 2020-10-10
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:34:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26921473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lollipop_Panda/pseuds/Lollipop_Panda
Summary: Even when Madoka didn’t like the rain, Misumi didn’t mind it. Over the years it had become like a friend, somewhere he could hide in plain sight.Here, sat on a lonely lonely bench as the rain pours around him and blurs the world in that fuzzy kind of way, Misumi waits.or, the one where Misumi and Madoka get to be brothers again, even if it's just for a little while.
Relationships: Ikaruga Madoka & Ikaruga Misumi
Comments: 4
Kudos: 40





	Rainy days and happy tears

**Author's Note:**

> This came out of nowhere. It was meant to be a twitter sized drabble for A3tober and... Here we are. Wrote the whole thing in about an hour or two in some blind frenzy and amazingly had little to no editing to do other than add the last two closing lines. 
> 
> Welp! I hope you enjoy! 
> 
> written for a3tober prompt: rain

Staring into the distance, Misumi brings his feet up onto the bench he’s sitting on and curls his arms around his legs, resting his chin on his knees. The sky is gray and the world blurs around him, trees gaining that fuzzy kind of contour they only ever get when it’s raining. Water drips from his hair and onto his knees as Misumi blinks slowly, smiling a little to himself. 

Madoka never did like the rain… Misumi clearly remembers him saying one day ‘the sky is crying’ and at the time he’d agreed, had had nothing other to offer than to smile brightly and say they needed to be happy so that the sky wouldn’t cry anymore. 

It all feels like so long ago, which, really, it is, but Misumi has a blank space in his memory between the years he left home and the ones where he finally found a new one within the Mankai Company, so all in all, maybe it hasn’t been that long. Not in the grand scheme of things. 

After all, what are a few years in a lifetime? 

Misumi remembers when they were kids, and Madoka was tiny and even cuter than he is now, remembers when his little brother would take his hand and hide behind him and refuse to go to anyone else. Misumi remembers crawling into Madoka’s bed when he was ten, sneaking past his sleeping parent’s bedroom so he could check on his little brother and make sure the storm wasn’t scaring him too badly. 

“The sky is crying,” Madoka would say, and Misumi would hush him and hug him and assure him that even if it was sad now, tomorrow the sky would be happy again and the sun would shine, because that’s how things work; after the storm comes the sun, after the bad comes the good. 

All you have to do is weather the bad and make it through to the good. 

Even when the bad lasts a long time. 

Water is still dripping from his hair onto his knees but there’s no telling the difference anymore, not between the salt-water running down his face or the rainwater pouring down on him, clothes soaked through and sticking to skin. 

But still Misumi sits, because even when Madoka didn’t like the rain, Misumi didn’t mind it. Over the years it had become like a friend, somewhere he could hide in plain sight. 

Here, sat on a lonely lonely bench as the rain pours around him and blurs the world in that fuzzy kind of way, Misumi waits. 

Misumi waits, because this is _the_ bench. The one where he and Madoka would get a snack from the konbini across the road and come to sit and eat, escaping their stifling home if only for a few minutes more, enjoying being themselves, being siblings, for just those precious moments of freedom. 

All those years ago, before their father had taken it upon himself to keep them away from each other, before Madoka had come to hate him. Before everything, when they were still young and Madoka still liked his older brother and cuddled into him during rainstorms like this one, because the sky was crying and Madoka didn’t like it when others were sad. 

Not even the sky. 

Suddenly, the rain above him stops, and Misumi blinks in confusion as it still continues to rain around him, and yet, he’s no longer getting wet. 

“Nii-san...?” the voice is quiet and soft and surprised, and Misumi’s eyes go wide as he looks up to stare at the person next to him, standing there and covering him with his umbrella as he now gets wet, white shirt turning gray from the rain and lavender hair growing a shade darker. 

“Madoka!” Misumi is up on his feet, ignoring the pins and needles from staying still in the same position for so long, getting up in his brother’s space and making sure he’s back under the shelter of his umbrella.

“Nii-san what are you…” Madoka starts to ask before trailing off, looking to the konbini across the road and looking back to his older brother, eyes wide and carrying hope and fear and uncertainty. 

Misumi can’t have that, because he prefers when Madoka is happy, and he’d be an even worse older brother than he already is if he didn’t do his best to make Madoka smile. 

“Madoka, did you want something from the konbini?” he asks, smile wide and happy, tears long-forgotten in order to focus on the young man in front of him, now so much taller, so mature, _too_ mature. 

In response, Madoka looks back to the konbini again before nodding slowly, and thus, Misumi only hesitates for a moment before gently taking Madoka by the wrist and tugging him towards the store, entering with a smile and ushering his little brother through. He pays for their treats and returns to the bench, Madoka struggling to keep up and keep the both of them under the umbrella. 

Sitting back down on the bench, Misumi opens the bag and holds out the melon bread that Madoka had requested, his little brother taking it gingerly, slowly joining Misumi on the bench, either forgetting or not caring that it’s wet (not that it likely matters, thanks to Misumi, Madoka is now soaked too…Misumi feels bad, but at least Madoka hasn’t run away, so that’s nice).

Misumi watches with a smile, soft and gentle and caring, as Madoka opens the bread and takes a bite from it. 

“Madoka…” he says quietly, turning to look at the onigiri in his hand, waiting for a beat, two, three, until he speaks again, almost unsure, “Happy birthday.” 

Looking up at last, Misumi catches the way Madoka’s breath hitches and his eyes go wide before they soften immeasurably, tears building visibly under the cover of his umbrella as he blinks furiously, and Misumi feels white hot panic rush through him, already hopping to his feet and flailing, wanting to reach to wipe his little brother’s tears but afraid of only doing more damage, until the umbrella falls to the floor and Madoka stands. 

The force with which Madoka collides against Misumi’s chest almost sends the both of them to the ground, but Misumi catches himself and immediately wraps his little brother in a hug, protective and strong, trying to shield him from the rain, the hurt, the world. 

Hands grip onto his soaked hoodie as Madoka lets out a sob, curling and hiding against Misumi’s chest, shoulders shaking, umbrella rolling on the floor next to them and bread laying forgotten, steadily soaking up the rain on the bench. 

They stay like that. For how long, Misumi doesn’t know, doesn’t care, because Madoka hasn’t pushed him away yet, instead is only holding on tight, tears flooding his face and mixing with rain water as Misumi holds him together as best as he knows how, whispering words of reassurance and praise, his own tears mingling with the rain. 

Finally, Madoka calms, shoulders no longer shaking, breathing evening. He stays where he is though, still gripping onto Misumi’s hoodie, knuckles white. Their world suspended; not yet ready to face the awkwardness, the distance, the time that’s passed between them and dug a trench that neither of them know how to climb over. 

Misumi smiles as he hears a quiet sniff, and wishes he had any tissues to spare - not that they’d be any use, soaked as he is - until a thought occurs to him, and his smile only grows. 

“Hey, Madoka?” he asks quietly, earning a quiet hum from said boy as he backs away enough to look at Misumi. 

“Sometimes, tears can be happy too…” he says, and Madoka frowns, confusion evident on his features, so Misumi elaborates, because for Madoka he’d put even the most complicated of his thoughts on paper if he could, send them soaring through the sky on a clear summer day, “Right now, the sky is crying, but sometimes, tears can be happy,” he explains. 

Confusion is clear as day on Madoka’s features, blinking once before a small but no-less bright smile lights up his face and a disbelieving chuckle leaves him, followed by another sniffle as he buries himself back against Misumi’s chest, shoulders shaking as he sobs through his laughter. 

Misumi can only grin and hold him close, watching as the rain slowly clears and makes way for the sun once more. 

Madoka never did like the rain, but Misumi finds he’s grown to like it. 

It feels a little like a triangle; rain, smiles and tears. And somewhere in the middle, the two of them make a perfect circle.

**Author's Note:**

> I will never not cry a little over these two... feel free to come cry with me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/PocketoPanda) (also quite curious to see if anyone picked up on something I "hid" in here...)


End file.
